The government of Pakistan has found out that the ecosystem required for freelancers to perform excellently as non-existent. Pakistani freelancer community is ranked fourth globally as the market share. It is good that it might not be too late and the fact that government is making alignment itself to work on improving payment solutions, which is needed to freelancers and it is good news for them.
It has been revealed in the standing committee on IT and Telecom this week that the freelancers in Pakistan cannot open the bank accounts and let them to use credit cards or the international payment solutions like PayPal that are not provided to them.
Senator Ateeq Sheikh of MQM(P) gave the briefing to the committee and said that it became hard for the freelancers to work and they get paid in Pakistan as banks do not consider freelancing a profession and they would not open the bank accounts on the basis of their freelance income.
When you want to open your accounts in the banks in Pakistan, they demand for the proof of income. The people, who work from 09:00 to 05:00, they can get the letter from their company and they can provide the sufficient proof of their income and job through this letter. It becomes impossible to fulfill the requirements if you are working as freelancer and the freelancing is not the legitimate profession for proof of their income. The freelancers have been denied for their bank accounts.
The senator emphasized that in this age and time, the response of the banks is counterproductive for the freelancers and nation alike. Mr Ateeq Sheikh gave the example of Indian village, where the freelancers are earning more than half of million Indian rupees per month through the online work.
He also said that you can get various other example of the online earning in Pakistan but they did not get the income through current support system, which is provided to the freelancers. What Mr Ateeq said in the meeting, it is the basic of requirements of ecosystem. A lot more is required to do and there is one good thing that the government has realized the area, which needs the attention of the policymakers.
If the facilities like PayPal, Intellectual property rights, dispute resolution, payment clearance guarantees, relaxation on taxes and similar various other policies are made and they are made available in Pakistan then the local freelancers can do the wonders.
Government Refusal to Freelancers to Open Bank Accounts in Pak,